Wallpaper* Best Use of Material 2026: Beit Bin Nouh, Saudi Arabia, by Shahira Fahmy

Home to more than 1,000 residents in its heyday, the ancient Arabian city of AlUla had been uninhabited since the 1980s, abandoned when a new town centre was established nearby. Here, hundreds of mud-brick houses, huddled around a tenth-century fortress, sat at the heart of a valley in an area that is today known for its many archaeological sites, including the Nabataean city of Hegra (Saudi Arabia’s first Unesco World Heritage Site), the ancient capital of Dadan and the rock inscriptions of Jabal Ikmah.

Discover Beit Bin Nouh, Saudi Arabia, by Shahira Fahmy

The old town is now at the centre of a heritage initiative by the Royal Commission for AlUla (RCU), which is restoring the district through careful conservation and new cultural programmes. Within the complex maze of alleyways, dating back to the 12th century, is Dar Tantora, a hotel that was restored in 2021 by Egyptian architect Shahira Fahmy using traditional construction and passive-cooling methods.

While working on Dar Tantora, Fahmy received a call from a long-term client, whose family is known for their large-scale projects across the Middle East, and who wanted to turn a ruin in the old town into a home. ‘He told me, you won’t understand anything unless you visit,’ she says. ‘No drawings can explain what is there.’ The site – a void formed from the remnants of two former houses – was known locally as Beit Bin Nouh, named after the family that had used the space as an open courtyard for gatherings.

The mud-brick houses had followed a layout that was repeated across the old town: three rooms on the ground floor were used for working, cooking and storage, and private rooms upstairs were for sleeping and family life. It was a simple model that was shaped directly by the region’s climate and conditions: a thick stone footing was there to withstand flash flooding; the mud-bricks, made from local soil, clay and straw, insulated the interiors; small windows controlled heat; narrow alleys created shade; and courtyards brought ventilation.

Fahmy’s team conducted a detailed reading of the topography, identifying original floor levels, thresholds and circulation patterns to ensure the rebuilt structures followed the logic of the earlier homes. ‘It was technical, philosophical and emotional. The bricks had to come from AlUla, and the act of making them connects you to the labour of those who built this town,’ says Fahmy, whose previous restoration work, notably in Cairo, has shaped her sensitivity to historic settings.

Every material and design choice ties the building back to its environment and historic construction methods. Stone was sourced from quarries approved by RCU; the tamarisk wood beams and door frames are treated with natural oils rather than chemicals; and woven palm fronds line the ceilings to create a breathable layer. Any new infrastructure is kept outside the historic walls, with pipes and wiring wrapped in palm rope, while the ancient qanat system of subterranean water channels was partially revived to handle drainage and reduce water consumption.

‘The first lesson was about sustainability,’ says Fahmy. ‘Water management, materials, how people lived with this climate. We followed what the place was already telling us.’ As a result, Beit Bin Nouh is a masterly example of how earth construction, when guided by the site itself, can carry a historic home into a contemporary context without losing its character. sfahmy.com